Using Font Alternate Characters and Ligatures

[Walter_H]

Hi, I use PSE 2020 on a Windows 10 PC. I recently purchased some fonts that contain alternate characters and ligatures. How do I use these alternate characters and ligatures in PSE 2020?

[hatstead]

Have you installed the fonts in the system font directory in Windows 10?

[Walter_H]

@hatstead, Yes! The basic font works fine in PSE. I want to type the alternate characters and ligatures. How do I do that?

[hatstead]

I don't have a clue, but engage the Font Forge community here:

Type & Typography on Adobe Support Community

[Glenn 8675309 · Accepted solution]

Open your character map in windows (just type "character" in the bottom left search box), copy whatever ligature you want.

Then paste it where ever you want.  If using it to replace.some other letter, select that letter, then paste the ligature.

1. select the ligature.
2. be sure to click o nthe copy button.
3. paste it as needed.

[Walter_H]

@Glenn 8675309, The Windows Character Map does work so I guess you'll get a "Correct Answer" for that. But, it's too darn tedious to use. It's small and difficult to see some characters. And it's hard to find the set of alternate characters amongst all of the foreign stuff in the font.

I was hoping that PSE might have some way to enter these characters that I hadn't discovered yet. Some of my fonts have numerous UPPERCASE and lowercase character variations. In Photoshop, it's easy to enter these alternate characters via the Glyphs panel. They're easy to find and a double-click enters it. Attached is a screenclip of the Photoshop Glyphs panel showing the alternate characters for HT Modern Hand Script 2 font.